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Firm Sues Sony Over Cell Processor
An anonymous reader writes that earlier this month, Sony received word of a lawsuit from a Newport Beach company called Parallel Processing. They've filed against the electronics giant alleging that the Cell processor, used in the PlayStation 3, infringes on a patent they own. They've made the somewhat outrageous demand that every infringing chip (and console) be 'impounded and destroyed'. From the article at Next Generation: "The patent, 'Synchronized Parallel Processing with Shared Memory' was issued in October 1991. It describes a high-speed computer that breaks down a program 'into smaller concurrent processes running in different parallel processors' and resynchronizes the program for faster processing times ... Parallel Processing said that Sony's alleged actions have caused 'irreparable harm and monetary damage' to the company."
If things weren't going bad enough for the PS3, then this comes along.
The game.
Are they going to go after AMD and Intel for their multicore CPUs?
Cheers!
Atheist: Buddhist in a Prius
Patent link. Should be in the summary, IMO.
... Parallel Processing receives an undisclosed amount of cash from MS.
Thanks god IBM quit building those RS/6000 SP2 system parallel thingies.
An errant Sony Jet has crashed into the HQ for Newport Beach based company Parallel Processing resulting in a 150 foot fireball.
They've made the somewhat outrageous demand that every infringing chip (and console) be 'impounded and destroyed'.
The US Constitution gives inventors "... the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." If they do win at trial, destruction of every infringing device is within their rights.
Whether they have a proper patent, and if Sony infringes on that patent, is an exercise for the reader and jury.
It's Linux, damnit! Pay no attention to renaming attempts by self-aggrandizing blowhards.
I don't think there ever was an "impound and destroy" precedent in patent law. It is completely ridiculous, and the only reason I see them doing it is so they have a starting point for a haggle-structure. You start with something completely preposterous, and any further proposal will come over as somewhat reasonable.
B.
Every experiment which ends in a big bang is a good experiment.
They don't want to have every PS3 impounded and destroyed. They want MONEY. By pushing for nuclear option they hope Sony will pay them off. They probably know that they don't have a chance to win in court but by making the stakes so high they are hoping that Sony will just give them a few million to go away.
If they where just asking for damages then Sony would without a doubt go to court and beat this case. So they want to push the risk level to a point that Sony will just offer them a wad of cash to get them out of their hair.
If they did recall all the PS3 Son would instantly loose not just the console race but it would also kill Blue Ray since the PS3 is the most popular Blue Ray player on the planet.
My guess is that Sony will smack them down anyway but it is a good gamble.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
I wouldn't be surprised if Sony took out contracts on these clowns, and made them sleep with the fishes.
How ya like dat?
IBM holds a lot of the IP that goes into the Cell. They have a very good legal department. This little company may just have bitten off more than they can chew.
I can see the IBM lawyers now..."Hmmm, interesting. Yes it may be possible that you have something there on this one patent. Let's see..." ruffles through a huge stack of papers in front of him. "However, we've discovered that you're also in violation of these 127 patents of ours. Now, shall we deal?"
What I find a bit odd and perhaps suspicious about this whole thing is the fact that this case is being filed not where this company seems to be located, and not where any Sony offices are located but in TEXAS. Why isn't this being adjudicated in LA or San Diego?
What do they think the bumpkins in Tyler might gain them?
It also seems bizarre that they are bringing suit only now. This product has been on sale to the general public for quite awhile. This means that it has been available to developers for ages. Why didn't this get nipped in the bud while the units were still game studio prototypes rather than waiting until Sony made and shipped a million of them?
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Do you really think people are going to volunteer to have their PS3 destroyed because you patented the computer processing version of the assembly line?
Yes. That's why we heard people are installing, uninstalling and reinstalling Windows all the times. Now we know it's not because it is unstable.
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
At least read the headline and figure out who's holding the patents.
Dear brain processor dude: this is God. Cease and desist. I own the patent on brains. Have a nice day.
u-bend
Stuff has been destroyed in the past by court orded (usually unsafe items). They dont go after the end user, they just get warrants against warehouses and then the court makes them dispose of the remaining product. The manufacturer tries a recall/rebate too.
The fact that this is even possible is further proof that the patent system is really useless.
While most dual/quad systems, the program or OS itself takes care the threading. With Cell and apparently this patent the master CPU helps take care of that. Still not a very patent. As the concept of a master node and slaves nodes for parallel processing has been around for decades. Just those tend to be 1 computer acting as a master with other slave "computer" nodes. Just in this patents case they're replacing "computer" with "CPU"
Personally I hope Sony wins.
from TFA "Parallel Processing said that Sony's alleged actions have caused "irreparable harm and monetary damage" to the company.".
Oh, Really?
Did they mean to say "Parallel Processing said that Sony's alleged actions have caused an opportunity to turn a fairly wide ranging patent that is useless on its own into some solid income via legal means.".
So they waited to see if the console was selling then hit them with a law suit so Sony would be more inclined to settle quick?
I am getting quite sick of IP trolls and patents that are so broadly phrased that they cover anything from toothpaste to nuclear physics. (disclaimer, I have not read the patent yet - but I am assuming that Sony carried out patent searches before building the Cell). And on that subject - why is the suite against Sony in particular not against the other members of the consortium that developed the Cell.
I hope Sony sees them in court instead of folding.
1 - "a plurality of multi-access memory modules;"
The PS3 does apparently use 4 RAM chips, but they don't appear to be multi-access. Elpida makes them, and I couldn't find ANY of their offerings that were 'multi-access'.
2 - "2. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the number of processors is equal to the number of multi-access memory modules."
Ouch, pretty sure there's 7 cores to that Cell processor, and NOT 7 RAM chips. (There's 4.)
6 - "including a plurality of multi-access memory modules,"
Too bad, guys, you lost your lawsuit before you started. The others are all based on 1 or 6, and losing both of those kills the whole thing for sure.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
I was asking myself the same question.
Transputers date back to the early/mid-'80s and patents therefore are out of date.
IIRC, each transputer had its own memory; it didn't share it.
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Karma: Chameleon
I think we have to acknowledge once and for all that for too many companies the purpose of a patent is to hide in a blind and wait for someone who has brains to make a go of something similar enough and resources to sue rather than make a product of their own.
It is sheer parasitism.
No, and no. There is a time honored tradition called the submarine patent, where you patent something, wait for someone else to develop it, wait some more for it to become profitable, and then sue. See NTP v. RIM for case in point, or read about the patent shenanigans surrounding the invention of the LASER (back when it was still capitalized).
Now, I know that some of you are out there saying the enemy of my enemy... But really it is nonsense like this that causes the big dogs to file so many stupid patents. If they don't patent the stupid and obvious, someone else might - and then sue them for it.
More companies need to see the light like IBM and realize that all patents after the first thousand or so are a liability, not an asset, and a cost, not an investment. Soon, after more suits like this start happening (look to the pharma and chemical industries) more major companies will start lobbying for patent reform, and then we might get something accomplished.
I believe your patent, filed in 4004BC, expired 5991 years ago.
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More to the point, can we ensure that those who modded this up never get mod points again ?
Polaroid v. Kodak. All of Kodak's infringing cameras had to be recalled and destroyed.
Recall that the claims define the patented invention. Always start reading at the claims, then look to the specification to determine what the claims mean (if necessary). Reading the abstract or specification gives little clue to what is actually patented.
So, I read the claims.
The only semi-unique thing there are the synchronization signals combined with standard MIMD architecture circa 1989. Yes, the transputer predates this patent and is likely to void it. There was a lot of other parallel 'puter research in the mid 80s including hyper cubes and other interconnection schemes. This is when "threading" was introduced into unix (versus the heavier process level stuff). They all used signals to report back that they were done, dead, or ready. The old math coprocessors in IBM PCs might be prior art.
Sony can get this patent tossed, but is more likely to throw the plaintiff a settlement to make it go away. Patent litigation is very expensive. It's often cheaper to just settle.
Why wait so long? The patent is almost expired! gotta use it before it's gone. Also, how much of the engineering level prior art still exists?
Why ask for every infringing device to be impounded/destoryed? Why not? It's within the law to seek that remedy even if it can't be reasonably performed. Since it can't be performed, they'll take money.
Oh yeah, the "impound 'em all" and "irreparable harm" stuff is boiler plate.
I am a lawyer, but not yours. Anything I tell you might be a total lie intended to benefit my clients at your expense.
They can have my PS3 when they pry it from my cold, dead, hands!
Putting a patent away until widely infringed is not a submarine patent. A submarine patent is produced via continuation practice. Continuations, divisions, and continuations in part are available while an application is being processed. Processing ends with issuance, abandonment, ... Under the old rules, a new app could be filed with an extremely old priority date. It's a bit harder now.
I am a lawyer, but not yours. Anything I tell you might be a total lie intended to benefit my clients at your expense.
but the copyright for the software running the brain (the trully interesting stuff) is still in effect - remember liftime of author + 70 years.
How about this: Let's just award them the full profits Sony's realized from the PS3 up through the date of the lawsuit.
Every penny.
I think this would be an eminently fair solution, and I'm confident Sony would accept it.
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If only there were some way of modding the modders...it'd be like moderation, only meta.
One rule of suits: Demand the moon, negotiate for the sky, but be willing to accept the ground.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
It is not correct that Kodak had to both recall and destroy their "infringing" cameras; there was just a recall. I had one of those Kodak cameras (as that was a much better camera than what Polaroid made at the time). All I had to do was remove the front nameplate and send it in for a refund. The only thing that "destroyed" what was left was that the film it used was no longer produced.
Fine. But we're not helping you find either of the two we sold.
If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
Fair question. If you think about it, they aren't going to alienate Sony by their irrational demands; they are already filing a lawsuit, which is enough to alienate just about anybody.
Lawsuits happen most businesses accept this fact and move on, simply getting sued is not something that most businesses take personally. Suing for unreasonable demands and publicizing the suit likely will.
It's much more desirable to negotiate down from "give me the moon, and throw yourself on your own sword" to some reasonable compensation than to attempt a more rational-sounding "pay me $5 million, and ten cents per unit henceforth" approach which would get laughed off and negotiated down to $50 and a cup of coffee by Sony.
Perhaps for the lawyer paid by the hour. Most lawyers don't go into these things blind, they have a good idea of their chances and how much litigation is going to cost and the trade-off point for settling. The ask for the sky strategy only drags things out and increases your costs paying lawyers to bounce offers off each other. The only time outrageous claims would be a positive is if they places a trade-off far higher then you expect and come back with a counter offer far higher then you really wanted. That virtually never happens and usually starting with a high but reasonable offer would yield similar results. Regardless it's fine an good (but may not be smart) to ask for the moon when negotiating outside of court. This ceased being negotiation when they filed a lawsuit. The lawyers will need to present this to a judge with a straight face and have quite real possibility of pissing of a judge or jury with the absurdity of damanges. It's a bad strategy all around.
So this was patented in 1991 and a patent is good for 17 years.
They sure waited a long time to be "irreparably harmed...
The copyright expired in 1952, seven decades after Nietzsche pronounced God dead in 1882. The first commercially sold computer, UNIVAC I, was also delivered in 1952. Coincidence? I think not.
In fact, while I was in the camera business, I got people all the time bringing those Kodak Star cameras in to ask for film. When I explained why I had no film they would invariably ask how much it was worth so they could sell it. Whenever I said nothing they would get all pissed because they spent good money on the camera, and I would have to explain that they could still get a partial refund from Kodak, but no one would buy the camera because you can't get film.
Since Polaroid makes money from film (the cameras are loss leaders) I never understood why they didn't work out a deal with Kodak by which they (Pol) would make film and Kodak could continue making the cameras, but was enjoined from the film side (obviously Kodak would shortly quit making the cameras on their own).
-nB
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2 Peter 3:8 says, "With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day." I'm sure He opts for "a thousand years are like a day", so he's had the patent just over 6 days. He still has a LONG time left on His patent!
A court order requiring that businesses destroy what you yourself admit are usually unsafe items is proof that the human system is really useless.
You play at the level of the field. Humanity doesn't set the bar very high for an enlightened legal system.
Divorce yourself from the idea that patents shouldn't exist for a moment and accept that they do (you can return to your normal anti-IP machinations in a moment). Given that basic assumption, the conclusion is reasonable. If you enforce patents with a "don't do that!" notice, nothing happens. The company must either pay enough to be discouraged or it must be punished in some other way--destroying the unsold product and forced to mount a costly recall, for example. Capitalist companies respond more or less only to money; taking money away from them is the most effective way to get them to stop doing something wrong. In point of fact, strong consequences are a prerequisite to a functioning system, precisely contrary to your statement.
Violating a controlling law, be it a safety law, import law, consumer protection law, or even a patent makes a product unfit for sale. That's true even if 99.9% of your cans of chili are perfectly good. You might find patents absurd, but I'll bet that there's a group of people who think consumer protection laws are absurd, too. They could make a compelling case about free markets and personal responsibility, but at the end of the day, consumer laws aren't going anywhere and neither are patents, and all for good reason.
Apparently Sony referenced this patent in their application:
3 s_cell_processor_faces_patent_challenge
/understatement
"Oddly enough, Sony's own patent, filed in 2001 and issued in 2007, actually lists the 1991 patent as a citation. In other words, Sony's own patent lawyers have already seen the old patent and deemed it not to be a threat, and the U.S. Patent Office apparently agreed when it issued Sony the patent in June."
http://news.digitaltrends.com/news/story/13725/ps
There may be very little ammo in this suit.